UEM European Drag Racing Championships, Sunoco Drag Challenge, Gardermoen Raceway, Norway

Words and pictures Ivan Sansom

The middle of a three week odyssey through Scandinavia and Germany for many of the European teams, the focus at the Sunoco Drag Challenge at Gardermoen (just outside the boundary fence of the main Oslo airport) was on two wheels and the UEM Drag Bike championship classes. Coming on the heels of the eliminations washout at Mantorp Park, Sweden, a better weekend weatherwise provided a tale of some mind boggling incremental times and some impressively dominant performances, although some organisational hitches and oildowns led to considerable delays to the frustration of all concerned during eliminations on the Sunday.

UEM Top Fuel Bike

After re-setting his own European eighth mile record at Mantorp the previous week, Peter Svensson and the Kendall crew were looking for some serious numbers over the quarter and the scene of their historic first five second pass outside of North America last year. They didn’t quite manage to repeat the feat, but qualified low with a 6.185 and were on something stunning when a 6.6 second pass came after the drive belt shredded three and a half seconds into the run. First round of eliminations and a 6.103/214mph was enough to handily cover a struggling points leader Kai Selkamaa, a semi final bye resulted in a 6.189/212mph. Crewchief Sören Svensson turned up the wick for the final round with Rene van den Berg, but it proved to be too much for the first 200 feet of the track and cloud of tiresmoke suggested that van den Berg might take his first UEM event win and move closer to the points lead. Just after the Dutchman’s crew had started to celebrate, Svensson found some traction and blasted past on a 6.644/231.80 to get past by a couple bike lengths in the lights.

Another raising eyebrows at Gardermoen was Jaska Salakari. After punting out a 4.12 eighth mile ticket in Sweden, Salakari arrived at the startline loaded for bear in the first qualifying session and flew to a 4.09 eighth mile clocking with the rear cylinder of the KTM Nitro Duke spewing raw fuel after 700 feet, the numbers translated to a cruising 6.594 at the quarter. The short figures suggest that Salakari will produce a world class V-Twin time if he can keep it lit on both cylinders to the finishline, and also prevent the fluid leaks that caused him to be shut-off before the first round of eliminations.